The present invention relates to the technical field of household electric cooking appliances of the toaster type and concerns more particularly a device for reheating rolls or pastries integrated into said toaster.
In this field, the reheating function is performed either with the aid of an additional removable accessory that comes to be positioned on the top of the toaster, or with the aid of an accessory integrated into the toaster, retractable when it is not used.
Thus, there is known, particularly from the document DE G 93 16 913.2, a toaster comprising a reheating means composed of two rigid metal wires unfoldable in rotation around an axis such as to form a support situated at a distance above the toaster. The breads and pastries placed on this support then have the benefit of the natural rising convection of the hot air exiting from the toaster. However, such a system results in rather long reheating times, due to the spacing of the wires from the toaster, while not guaranteeing a uniform reheating, the major part of the heat flow being located at the level of the opening above the heating chamber. Moreover, the mechanism for rotating the wires can deteriorate or sag under the weight of the food to be reheated. In addition, such a device is an element added to the toaster, requiring additional parts, particularly for the rotation of the wires, which increases the sale price of said toaster.
The patent DE G 91 15 161.9 describes a toaster having a removable reheating means composed of a receptacle where the bread rests on a grill. Below the latter is disposed a perforated diffuser to channel air from one side to the other of the bread that is placed to be reheated. Heat radiation is guided and reflected onto the lateral walls of the bread. This arrangement permits, certainly, a more efficient reheating of the bread than the wire devices, by a better distribution of the heat coming from the toaster, but it constitutes a cumbersome and complex accessory to the toaster and, by this fact, increases in a notable manner the price of the toaster. Moreover, in a utilization of the toaster for toasting of the slices of bread, this accessory must be removed and becomes cumbersome, and risks being lost.
The objective of the present invention is to overcome the problems presented by the prior art by proposing a toaster having a frame arranged in a casing, at least one vertical grilling chamber open at the upper part of the casing, a peripheral roof at the opening of the grilling chamber and forming a unit with the toaster, having an upper rim provided with openings, heating means located in proximity to the grilling chamber, characterized in that at least part of the rim of the roof is raised relative to the upper part of the casing.
Thus, the toaster retains its compact general form while being able to offer the possibility of reheating rolls, disposed on the rim of the roof without having elements that are removable or rocking, while avoiding causing the bread to rest directly on the casing that is generally of plastic, thus avoiding having it deteriorate.
This roof can be a sheet of steel or of metal material, but can equally be made of other nonmetallic materials such as heat resistant plastics, i.e. having thermomechanical properties adapted to the type of cooking performed in the appliance, permitting a cost reduction. Materials of the baked clay or ceramic type, possibly covered with a layer of enamel on the face intended to be in contact with food products can also be utilized, permitting, by their thermal inertia, maintenance of the food products in a heated condition. Other materials, such as glass, being able to be easily cleaned, are equally included in the field of the present invention.
According to a variant of construction of the invention, the rim of the roof has bosses, such as to present support points at different heights. These bosses permit either to raise at least a part of the rim of the roof with respect to the upper part of the casing, or, when the rim is entirely raised relative to the casing, to delimit hollow zones for an easier positioning of the bread. Moreover, these bosses can be provided to arrange passages for hot air under the bread which is thus heated in a more uniform matter.
Advantageously, the openings in the rim of the roof are located at the level of zones for positioning the bread. Rising hot air can then escape into the hollow parts resulting from the bosses, which aids a better distribution of the heat into the zones provided to receive the bread.
As a variation and/or a complement to the preceding form of construction, the rim of the roof slopes toward the opening of the heating chamber, permitting, on the one hand, to better seat pastries above the opening of the toaster, and, on the other hand, to avoid having the bread come in direct contact with the openings of the roof.
Advantageously, a peripheral space is arranged between the roof and the casing in order to isolate said casing from the roof, thus allowing utilization of plastic materials which have inferior technological properties and are thus inexpensive.
Advantageously, the roof is fixed to the frame of the toaster, thus facilitating formation of the peripheral space separating the rim from the casing. By extension, the roof and its rim are of sheet metal and result from an extension of the frame of the toaster, permitting economies in the number of pieces and the assembly time.
According to a variant of construction, the roof is connected to the casing by the intermediary of insulating ribs.
Advantageously, the grilling chamber is delimited by two gripping grills that are substantially vertical and able to be moved toward one another when the heating elements are supplied with electricity, said gripping grills having an upper rim that is substantially perpendicular to said grills and oriented toward the outside of the chamber, in a manner to partially close the heating chamber, when they approach one another, in order to thus deflect the flow of ascending hot air generated by the heating elements.
This configuration permits the heat generated by the heating elements to be deliberately distributed so that they are not concentrated only toward the central part of the chamber, the rim thus arranged acting as a deflector to divert the hot air.
The ascending hot air, partially diverted, is thus distributed, which aids a uniform heating of bread placed on the roof.
According to an advantageous variant, the rim of the roof presents, at its base, an exterior flange inclined at an angle xcex1 at least equal to 30xc2x0 with respect to the horizontal.
This flange permits the flow of heat coming from the rear face of the reflector to be oriented towards the reheating zones while thermally protecting the casing.
Advantageously, reflectors are associated with the heating elements, said reflectors presenting, toward their upper extremity, a narrowing by the intermediary of two converging slopes. This narrowing is favorable to a good conservation of the heat in the toaster in its toasting mode, while permitting orientation of the thermal flux laterally, for a uniform reheating of bread disposed on the rim of the roof.
According to one form of construction of the invention, the toaster is constituted by two vertical heating chambers, by two lateral heating elements each situated between a heating chamber and the casing of the toaster, these two elements being connected electrically in series, as well as a central heating element situated between two heating chambers, and connected in parallel with the two lateral heating elements, a switch permitting disconnection of the two lateral elements in order to only supply current to the central heating element during the reheating operation.
This particularity permits, notably in the case of a high power toaster, to effectuate the reheating of rolls disposed on the rim of the roof emerging from the toaster, at a power that is relatively low and compatible with the desired reheating effect. Moreover, by only supplying current to the central heating element, losses toward the lateral wall of the casing are reduced.
The present invention will be better understood with the aid of the description that will follow, with reference to the attached figures, given by way of non-limiting example, among which:
FIG. 1 is a transverse cross-sectional view along the axis Axe2x80x94A of FIG. 2 of a toaster having a grilling chamber, according to the present invention,
FIG. 1A is a detail of the upper part of the toaster, according to a variant of construction,
FIG. 2 is a partial top view of a toaster having a single grilling chamber according to FIG. 1,
FIG. 3 is a transverse cross-sectional view along the axis Bxe2x80x94B of FIG. 4 of a toaster having two grilling chambers, equipped with the present invention,
FIG. 4 is a partial top view of a toaster according to FIG. 3,
FIG. 5 presents a variant of construction of the heating device according to the invention.